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Our New Ikea Kitchen in the Countryside

Some of you may have already noticed, that we have renovated a little flat in the countryside this summer. We always have spent a lot of time in the surroundings of Berlin and even lived there half of the time. Even if we are both born in Berlin there is nothing more essential and inspiring than nature to us. When we started working together we even had our studio in the countryside for a long time. Because of some family circumstances we had to look for a new place this summer and after a brief frustration, suddenly everything happened very quickly.

The apartment is in the house of friends and as there hasn’t lived anyone for 10 ten years we had to do a complete makeover. Many elements in the house have been preserved, as we wanted to keep some rough aesthetics. Today we’ll show you one of our favorite place of the house – the kitchen.

To emphasize the charm of the old house and the environment, we’ve been looking for a kitchen, that optically reflects a slightly rural style, but still with a modern twist. The black metod- laxarby-kitchen from IKEA was exactly, what we were looking for. As we cook a lot and also often work in the countryside it was very important, that the kitchen is not only visually perfect, it also had to be functional. Especially since the kitchenette is only 3 meters long, we had to think carefully and plan which elements and storage space possibilities are the best. very quickly we agreed, that we wanted to use almost exclusively drawers (instead of base cabinets with doors) because it is not only more convenient and easier when using, but the storage space also exploits maximum good. opposite the kitchenette we have our dining table, as you have the most beautiful view into the garden there. Actually there was only one space left for the refrigerator, fortunately we had the idea to use the small niche in the rear part of the kitchen. Although there is only 1 meter wide space, we have a large fridge and a small, but very high cabinet with many counter shelves and drawers and are really excited about all that storage space in such a small kitchen! Initially we were afraid that the large black cabinet might seem a little clunky, but we were very pleasantly surprised how wonderful it fits.

The accompanying service (bookable) was a real life saver for us, not only because a few important little things were changed, so we even had more storage space as previously planned by us, but without them we would have no dishwasher, because during all the excitement and many details to which one must think, we only had the vanity unit planned for the dishwasher, but not the device itselfe.

We are technically reasonably talented, but to build up a whole kitchen by ourselves is not a good idea. So we booked the Ikea-construction-service, which of course you have to pay extra for, but it’s so worth it! It saves you so much time – within a few hours, our kitchen was built, i guess we would have needed a week for it.

The guys from the construction-service were very nice and thanks to their daily construction routine they solved some problems (we have an uneven ground in the kitchen) very quickly with all their improvisation and craft. We loved it!

We are really pleased with our ikea-kitchen and always so happy when we cook or bake.

As you can see in the photos we made a plum cake, when we’ve been shooting the kitchen and of course we also have the recipe for you guys today. It’s a very simple recipe, but this is exactly how a plum cake needs to taste for me! We hope you had a lovely weekend and enjoy a big piece of cake!

Gluten-free Plum Cake

(for a 26cm-ø springform pan)

Ingredients

200g rice flour

100g buckwheat flour

100g cornstarch (or you can use 400g flour in total)

250g soft butter

200g coconut blossom sugar (if you take white or brown sugar you should use 30g less)

4 eggs (size s)

3 tsp organic baking powder

2 tsp cinnamon

1 vanilla bean

(maybe 1-3 tbsp milk/heavy cream; if the batter is a bit firm)

1kg plums

Furthermore

3-4 tbsp sugar (to sprinkle on top of the cake plus for the heavy cream)

200g heavy cream

a bit confectioners´ sugar

Preheat oven to 180°C (360°F) top/bottom heat. Rinse plums, half and pit plums – set aside for a moment. Line the bottom of the springform pan with parchment paper, butter and flour the sides – place the pan in the fridge. Beat soft butter, coconut blossom sugar, salt and the vanilla pulp for 5min (with the whisk of your hand mixer). Then beat in one egg after the other for 20-30sec. Blend rice flour, buckwheat flour, corn starch, baking powder and cinnamon. Sieve in 2 portions to the butter-mix and stir in with the dough hook of your hand mixer – stir in 1-3tbsp milk/heavy cream, if the batter feels to firm. Spread the batter evenly into the springform pan and push the plum halves down about one third into the batter – arrange in circles (distance between the plums should be quite narrow, so the cake turns juicy). Bake plum cake for 50-60min (do the toothpick test), then let the plum cake cool down for 20-30min on a cooling rack before you remove the sides of the springform pan – sprinkle about 2 tbsp sugar on the cake/pums, just when the cake comes out of the oven. You can also sprinkle some confectioners´sugar on top for decoration. Whip the heavy cream with 1 tbsp sugar and serve the plum cake lukewarm with the whipped cream.

It's such a gorgeous space and studio! Decoration on point! Ooooh kitchen renovations, I know what you've been through! ;)I'll hope to visit again Berlin soon and would love to hang out with your ladies in this beautiful studio! And the countryside aaaah... As much as I love living in the city, I am always so attracted by the nature! <3

hahahaha.. I love how modest & funny you are that you said you were 'technically reasonably talented;' however, I just want to confirm to you both right now that you are NOT 'technically reasonably talented,' but you are SUPER TALENTED OFF THE CHART!!!

Anonym Aug 23, 2016

It's quite a raw style but I just love the contrast between this modern style furniture and the room's walls, floor etc... and these colours! Oh my, cooking (and just being!) here must be a REAL pleasure :)

thanks a lot der christelle <3 oh yes, renovations are always stressful but the feeling afterwards is just the best :) that sounds amazing, would love to hang out when you're in town!! just let us know when you're coming <3 lot's of hugs and have a great weekend!!

Yes, we decided to move back last year because I got pregnant and it was simply easier to have the baby in Norway. I really miss Berlin though! We still have our apartment in Charlottenburg so we can always go back. :)